What I Wish I had Known About Natural Fibres

Like most people I had learnt to knit with an array of acrylic yarns. Starting with basic DK weight yarns and building up to various weights and textures. In 2022 I had wanted to make the switch to natural fibres. I began looking into what was available and immediately experienced a culture-shock of sorts.

Natural fibres cost more: In my acrylic era, I had gotten into an easy habit of picking up yarn in any shop that sold colours or weights that I liked. Craft stores, home stores, even budget stores such as Poundland. If I liked the look of the yarn and the price was low I would be going home with more yarn. In those days I rarely spent more than £3.50 for 100g balls of yarn and these were the bulky and textured yarns. Making the switch to natural fibres I found the yarn to be steeply more expensive. I never once felt that it was overpriced but I had a decision to make. If I was going to switch to natural fibres I would either need to increase my craft budget or reduce the volume of yarn I purchased. It wasn't until 2023 that I actually started to acquire natural fibre yarn as this was when I was able to to do a bit of both.

Natural Fibres are different to work with: Now, my acrylic projects probably could have looked better with blocking especially lace work but I never blocked before the switch. Blocking was a bit of a mystery to me, not the how but the why. Why are you blocking your projects, just knit and voila! However, when I switched to natural fibres it was undeniable that I must block! The fibres just do not behave in the same way, cotton for example has pretty much no stretch at all, it just stays where you put it. So when knitting, it also does not bounce back to where it needs to be without help. Wool on the other-hand has a lovely bounce and so needs help staying where you put it. Natural fibres is a broad term encompassing many materials and you have to know about the specific fibre you are working with. It's a steep learning curve.

They are much harder to find: I am very lucky to have a local yarn shop with a fantastic selection of natural fibre yarns and blends. However, for in-person shopping this is pretty much it. Otherwise I would need to shop online. It's not the end of the world, but again this was a bit of an adjustment after I was used to picking up yarn anywhere I went. It can be especially challenging if I am looking for a particular fibre or colour as then I often do need to go online.

You're projects will have a different vibe: Natural fibres tend to have a more muted, rustic or mature aesthetic to them. Especially 2-stranded projects that use mohair or wools with a prominent halo. That's not to say acrylic projects look bad, they often look very bright and playful and that is an aesthetic many may love. It's not my personal taste but that's okay. There are of course bright and colourful natural fibre options especially in the cotton selections often used for amigurumi but even then a lot of the colours are more muted. I personally really loved this, as it meant my projects were more closely aligning with my colour palette goals.

You won't want to go back: I wish I had known this in the early days of adjusting to natural fibres and it's additional steps. I just spent more money on one cone of yarn than I had in likely 2 years of acrylic stash building. The fibres were not sitting how I expected and I was wondering if I really did know how to knit after all despite being quite an experienced knitter. But a year on and I can barely touch acrylic yarn know. To me it feels unnaturally soft in an off-putting way, whilst some of the cheaper yarns feel too obviously plastic. Of course there are some very nice acrylic yarns that even I have considered but other than working through my old stash, I am now very happy with natural fibres.